


But my heart goes up in smoke

by orphan_account



Category: X-Men (Alternate Timeline Movies), X-Men: Apocalypse (2016) - Fandom
Genre: Erik-centric, Fix-It, M/M, Reconciliation, Telepathy, Vaguely Canon-compliant
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-26
Updated: 2016-06-26
Packaged: 2018-07-18 11:18:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,010
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7313098
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Before Apocalypse, before that fateful day in the workhouse and the end of the world as humans knew it, Erik stood alone in a forest. But that wasn’t true, not really, because he could see Nina there in the distance, crouched in the sparse grass with the muddied trim of her dress ruffled round her knees. She reached out for the muzzle of a fallow doe, and the animal gravitated to her as easy as metal had once done for him, called to hand by a doting master.</p><p>Then the birds stopped singing, the light that passed through the treetops lost its pallor, and the doe raised its head to stare back at him. </p><p>“This isn’t real,” Charles said, in Erik’s head. “Erik, this isn’t real.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	But my heart goes up in smoke

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written after my first viewing of xma last month. 
> 
> Spoilers, obviously.

i.

“This used to be the center of the universe before I was betrayed,” Apocalypse declared, the aging remnants of Cairo spread out before him. “It will be once again.”

He raised his arms.

On the ground behind him, Charles said nothing. He looked to Erik as he had done more than was strictly necessary throughout his conversation with Apocalypse. The bitterness on his tongue was still there. That all he had hoped for Erik would crumble so easily, and for the worst reasons—

Apocalypse didn’t know what Charles knew about Erik, because they saw him from different sides of the board. Erik was more than the pain and suffering, than _this._

And so Charles looked up at Erik, eyes darting back and forth over his old friend’s face—shadowed, beneath the new helmet—and felt his mouth part as he thought hurriedly for some kind of plan. Then their eyes met, and wasn’t it just like old times: Erik’s attention dipped immediately to Charles’ lips, caught on that single movement in a moment that couldn’t have been worse.

Tiredly, Erik smiled. It was more depreciating than Charles was used to, where once he had expected that same pride and utter, unapologetic certainty to make a mocking grin of Erik’s mouth. It would’ve made sense anyway; in this, here and now, Erik had clearly won.

Erik’s gaze flicked to the intricate plating that ran down Apocalypse’s backside. “Actually,” he said. “I’ll be taking it from here.”

 

ii.

“Henryk,” Magda said, with the kind of amused light in her eyes that told of a joke only she was privy to.

He jolted at the name, and it took him a long moment to draw back from the tangled webbing of his distant thoughts. He’d forgotten. Dinner. They were having dinner in Adrian Blaski’s kitchen. At the workhouse earlier that morning, Adrian had asked after Henryk’s family joining Adrian’s for supper; they were neighbors, after all, and he and Henryk got on well enough.

At some point though, it would seem Henryk had enough to drink. He couldn’t for the life of him remember what had been said all night; what he’d been about to say before he trailed off, mid-sentence.

At the opposite head of the table, Adrian cocked his head slightly, and the kitchen lights drew shadows down the man’s narrow, gaunt cheeks. On Henryk’s left, Magda shifted uneasily; her amusement had already slipped into muted concern. To his right, Nina continued shoveling mashed potatoes into her mouth, her father’s odd behavior gone unnoticed.

“Sorry,” Henryk told the table, not missing the puzzlement that crossed both Claudia—Adrian’s wife—and their son Andrzej’s faces. The lie was ash between his teeth. “Lost myself for a moment there.”

Magda came to his rescue. She laughed, prompting the rest of the table to join in. “A good sign you’ve been working too hard,” she said, and rested her head on one hand, “That’s my Henryk.”

Adrian nodded, grave. “To better days and better pay,” he declared solemnly, and raised his glass of watered-down ale.

The conversation rekindled, and it was more obvious than before, a certainty of the kind Henryk—no, _Erik_ —was familiar with. There was something about this kitchen, this ... moment. Déjà vu, of a sort, but not quite.

An ache wretched itself into being, what was first a tiny bloom of soreness that creeped outward from his heart. Hurriedly, he looked down at Nina—saw for himself that she was there without knowing why he felt, rather suddenly, like she wasn’t. Couldn’t.

As she bent forward over her plate, Nina’s long hair fell into her face, and she huffed, brushing it back over her shoulder with a tight pinch to the corner of her mouth that could remind him of none one but her mother. The loud talk of the table became incomprehensible. Long enough for Nina to catch sight of her father’s expression, of Erik, staring at her with slack incomprehension through Henryk’s eyes.

“Papa?” she asked, and procured a soft smile for him, more childish for the bits of bean around her mouth. “Are you all right?”

She pushed the last of the hair from her eyes, and Erik could have sworn he knew them—the color, not the right shade of blue to be Nina’s, but one he had lost the memory of years ago despite the worn, loved edges he’d once carried it with.

They were Charles’ eyes. But then, abruptly, they were Nina’s again.

The soreness was gone because it had never been there to begin with. Henryk didn’t feel the need to rub at an ache that wasn’t. And by the time Adrian prompted, “Henryk, what was that you were saying about the supervisor?” he had returned to the conversation as seamlessly as if nothing had happened at all.

Which for all intents and purposes ... it hadn’t.

 

iii.

“My son,” came the steady, _old_ timbre of Apocalypse’s voice. He was the one they once called En Sabah Nur, the false god and the only true one. _My son_ , he murmured as if he were speaking to a child that had said something particularly nonsensical, that in most cases would warrant a confused laugh and the fond ruffling hair.

But in one where Magneto had just sent a molted iron slab straight through a god’s chest, apparently that warranted Charles _yelling_ , instead.

“Erik, no!”

Nothing was making sense. To Charles, Erik had already made it clear. A line drawn in the sand: us against them. All of Erik’s pain, that which Apocalypse set out to wield like a weapon—turned right back around again to bite the hand that gave it purpose.

The moment Apocalypse had raised his arms to begin the assemblage of his new kingdom, he hadn’t calculated one of his horsemen betraying him, much less that they would hit him during that minute half-second of vulnerability. Namely, by Charles’ calculation, that was when the false god’s power was fanning out over the desert, and Cairo.

With the helmet in place, it was impossible to decipher the emotions on Erik’s face—a point of contention that left Charles feeling no small amount of inadequacy in that moment. There had been that private, weary smile he’d angled down for Charles’ pleasure, though it meant little when Erik was once again _hurting_ him by choosing the wrong side.

Whereas a normal human might have been choking on their own blood, Apocalypse only stared at Erik, and slowly lowered his arms. “My son,” said again, calm, as the iron _pulled_ and _twisted_ , and the false god was spun round to face Magneto and the shocked faces of his horsemen—all of whom now looked little more than the scared teenagers they were. “Why?”

Almost idle, Erik replied, “I admire what you’ve started, and I’m ready to finish it at all costs—but really, do you think I’m stupid?”

Neither Psylocke nor Angel dared move. Directly across from where Charles lay sprawled out on the ground, Storm’s upper lip twitched in the beginnings of a vicious snarl. But they waited, all of them, to see what their god would do to the Judas in their midst.

“I expect better of all my children,” was all Apocalypse intoned, deceptively soft. “Even you.”

“Even you,” Erik mused. The flatness of that voice, Charles knew, belied the cold, unknowable measure of Erik’s fury. “Storm told me that you require a new body.” And here, he finally broke eye contact, sent Charles one last, lingering glance. Though thankfully, Charles was spared the embarrassment of those eyes on his _mouth_ a second time, in front of a live audience no less.

Erik’s outstretched hand squeezed into a fist.

The first obvious sign of pain twitched along Apocalypse’s left eye.

“You intend to take Charles’ power as your own, I see that now,” Erik continued. “And I am afraid I cannot allow that.”

 

iv.

In the kitchen sink, the bucket overfilled and water poured over the rim.

“Papa, come quick!”

Henryk startled, feet and shoulders squaring faster than any soldier, and his hands came down hard on the sink edge. “ _Verdammt,_ ” spat out furiously beneath his breath as he scrambled to shut off the faucet. Where had he been, just a moment before—what was he doing when he—

“ _Papa!_ ”

Henryk pushed off from the cabinet and whirled round in time to see Nina rush in through the open door from the backyard. Her face was flushed and streaked with dirt, but the dress Magda had sewn for Nina’s sixth birthday just a few weeks prior remained miraculously untouched. He saw the grabbing motion she made for his sleeve seconds before her little fingers connected—pulling at him with a desperation he’d hoped to never see in his daughter.

“Please, papa!” she cried, and he saw them now, the tears that had become almost indistinguishable from the spots of mud on her reddened cheeks.

A part of Henryk that was long buried, the part that was gunpowder and screaming razorwire, that he’d sworn himself against the same day he’d abandoned a helmet in a factory in Moscow—that part bubbled up in his chest and threatened to ignite. Without realizing it, his hands began to shake.

“Nina?” he demanded, “What’s wrong? Where’s your mother?”

The choking noises Nina made between sobs became less distinct, broken with gasps for air as she tugged incessantly at Henryk’s arm. “’n the forest,” she said, more or less—she was upset enough that her words were becoming half-spoken and slurred, “The clearing—I went to see the birds, and I saw—the deer, it’s _screaming_ —“

He clenched his hands into fists, unclenched them again. Gentle so as to not frighten her, Henryk cupped one palm behind Nina’s head and brought it to rest against his waist. “Nina. _Slow down_.”

She sniffled, and he waited, allowing her enough time to calm. “You have to help it,” she mumbled into his shirt. “ _Please_ , papa. It’s hurting.”

And then he knew. Henryk moved to kneel in front of her. He brushed the hair from Nina’s face, took it in both hands. “I will. I will, but you have to show me where.”

Nina lead him to the clearing at a breakneck run. It wasn’t difficult, keeping up with a child, but he was slowed down by what he _thought_ was waiting around every grove of trees, by the creaking of boughs and the foreign scratching of wild animals that his mind couldn’t help but mistake for danger—it was a sixth sense, he knew, for the inevitable, but one that nowadays was nothing more than a curse.

“Over here, papa,” came the quiet sound of Nina’s voice. He could feel the way his heart pounded; he was heaving and shaking from the exertion.

On the side of a small slope, in a clearing that, in actuality, was no more than several yards across, Nina stood much too close to a large, fallen buck. As she neared, it jerked its head across the carpet of dead leaves and thrashed its front hooves out once, twice.

“Nina,” Henryk called in warning, “At least five feet back.”

Henryk approached warily. Kicked at the leaves round the buck’s rear legs. He’d felt the metal before they were anywhere near the clearing—a bright pinprick of _feeling_ , like a small fire that warmed the palm of his hand even half a mile away. The teeth of the bear trap were sharp enough to be new, but imperfect; they ran longways, and when the trap had snapped shut, it caught one of the buck’s hooves clean while only managing to badly mangle the other.

This type of weapon wasn’t meant for deer. Whatever Henryk could have done, there was nothing for it now. It would die.

Even now the metal sang to him; a single, distinct note. He could have sworn he’d heard it once, in an old song played on a gramophone in a bar in Argentina, or maybe it was Brazil—no matter, that was a memory of the kind _this_ life had no use for.

The buck jerked its head off the ground again, and its flanks fluttered as it tried—and failed—to pull itself back up on its stomach. The air shifted at Henryk’s side. “Papa ...”

“Ssh, Nina,” Henryk hushed. “I’ll make it right.”

He couldn’t remember the last time he used his power. His hand hung by his hip, and he turned it palm up. The barest twitch of two fingers had the teeth recoiling from the buck’s skin, slick with blood and without protest; in fact, despite how long it had been—two years, three? Henryk lost count—the metal opened and reset itself, coming to heel as only the most loyal of dogs might in response to his voice.

 _It’s been too long_ , whispered the mutinous, darkest region of Henryk’s mind. _But not long enough._

Without so much as a thought, the metal trap crumpled in on itself.

If Nina noticed, she didn’t care. She only had eyes for the buck, falling to her knees by its head before Henryk could throw an arm out to stop her. It jerked away from her and brought one of its powerful legs forward to knock her down. Seconds before Erik could call the metal back to life, send it straight through the animal’s neck to stop it—“Nina, no!”—Nina had flung herself over its flank and placed a careful hand beneath its eye.

“I’m here,” she whispered. “Don’t hurt me. Don’t hurt papa. You’ll be okay soon.”

In that instant, the buck quieted. It laid back down, breathed easy, and let his daughter brush her hand up past its ear, to trail her fingers along the fuzz that covered antlers larger than the width of her shoulders.

“How did it—“ _How did_ you, Henryk realized. _Nina did that._

The shock that shot through him was bright hot, and it swelled warmly in his chest. Pride. He was _proud_. Like he had never seen something so beautiful as Nina with twigs in her hair and mud on her face, her hair in disarray—as she told a wild animal to _calm_ , and it obeyed.

His jaw had gone slack, but when he heard something snap somewhere off to his right, his heart jumped up in his throat hard enough to choke. If someone saw her, if they tried to _hurt_ her, _nononoicant, iwontletthem_ touch _her—_

Before Henryk realized what he was doing, the crumpled metal flew to hover a scant few inches above his hand, liquefying and reforming into something sharp and lethal in the span of three seconds. He whipped around, eyes dark and blazing.

A deer. Two of them, bucks also. They hung back near the edge of the clearing, and the closer of the two—the one that, evidently, had made the noise—took another hesitant step forward.

“Papa.” Henryk flinched, and made himself look down. He was heaving heavily again.

Nina smiled at him. “They’re just saying goodbye.”

Nina’s irises were white. For the briefest moment, Henryk was terrified that she had somehow gone _blind_ , but then she blinked, and they were back to her normal blue.

“Do they...,” Henryk began, as he sank to his knees beside her, “speak to you?”

He kept his eyes on the other bucks while he reached out. When he placed his hand over Nina’s, on top of the animal’s cheek, he saw her worrying her bottom lip out of the corner of his eye.

“You’re not mad?”

With a sudden, intense vehemence, Henryk shook his head.

“On the contrary,” he said steadily, and leaned forward to press his forehead against hers. “It’s the most wonderful thing I’ve ever seen.”

And it was. Beneath their hands, the buck’s breathing slowed further. Then it stopped altogether. Henryk hadn’t been needed after all.

“I told him it was okay to go,” Nina said, voice wet with renewed tears.

It ... was something incredible. Whatever his daughter had. It may have taken Henryk years to reach this point, but ... he found he loved her no more than he had yesterday, or the day before that. Things changed, but always remained the same.

“You did a good thing,” he stated, sincere, and tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear. “Now, it’s getting late,” and here he stopped, to watch the retreating shapes of the other deer through the leaves and bracken. “Let’s get back before mama worries, yeah?”

The metal he reformed as small as possible then broke apart into pieces. Blunted by a swift caress of his power, they would never bring harm to another ever again. The buck ... he promised Nina that he would return for, to bury.

But before they could leave the clearing, Henryk found his attention drawn back to it. It was a strong animal, regal and proud; to be downed by man in such a way seemed almost ... demeaning. He felt sorry for it, and oddly enough, there was an undercurrent of guilt coloring his thoughts. For the buck to lose its legs ...

Henryk froze.

In the back of his mind, he felt the dim vibration of an echo. Like a tuning fork that’s been struck only different somehow—familiar, though he couldn’t quite place it. _You have to_ fight _this, Erik. Don’t let him win_.

“Come _on_ , papa.”

Behind him, Nina looked expectant.

Henryk shook his head to clear it, a sudden roughness in his throat. He was imagining things again.

Of course, he hadn’t heard anything at all.

 

v.

Charles came to on a makeshift bed in a room with only one window. Moira hovered overhead, and he had hardly a moment to stare up at her, blinking blearily and rather stupidly, before he remembered where he was. For the best, really, considering he’d nearly gone cross-eyed with confusion over _why is Moira here oh god how has it been twenty years she doesn’t know what I did to her_ —before his recollection of the past few days snapped back into place.

“Erik,” he breathed, and instantly began to push himself up.

“Professor, please, you have to remain calm,” Moira ordered, not unkindly, “The kids— _your_ kids—they’ve come to help.”

 _Jean_ , he called out immediately. It was much like being in water and knowing without physically seeing another person that they were near, just by the way the water pushed back against him, displaced by the pulsing wave of Jean’s power— _I’m here_ , it told him.

“Jean,” said aloud now. Charles closed his eyes. _Jean, what’s happening? How long have I been out?_

Charles had touched the mind of many a telepath in his day, but none—save perhaps Emma Frost all those years ago—could ever match the depth of feeling that shot through his own mind when he touched Jean’s. However, where Emma’s had been chilly and unwelcoming, Jean always greeted him, unconscious or not, with warm sunlight.

_Professor! I heard your message and we came as soon as we could. Hank and Scott and Kurt. Raven and Pietro, too. I don’t know if we can hold out much longer, the others—_

And then he saw it in mind’s eye; or rather, _Jean’s_ eyes. She stood somewhere on the ground before this very building, scanning the fields of battle. The one called Psylocke was engaged with Raven—she’d taken on Psylocke’s form, a mirror image as they moved together, though the sharp trill of their perfectly matched swords meeting was drowned out by Hank’s roar.

Hank was likewise engaged with Storm, a young girl whose mind thought of herself as Ororo with immense pride but also apprehension. Charles only need brush the faintest of touches along the cloud of thoughts, there, to see _Raven’s_ face staring back at him above the fugue. Ororo knew Mystique in as much a way any mutant did today, and realizing that Raven was on the opposing side of this conflict made her doubt. She no longer trusted Apocalypse.

Which was rather well, knowing this was what made her pull her strikes from hitting true. Hank would be safe for now.

Kurt was nowhere in sight, but neither was the last of Apocalypse’s four horsemen, Angel.

The last though ... the avid centerpiece of this mess—was Erik.

Pain shot through Charles’ temple. He staggered forward, threw a hand up to steady three fingers against his forehead. He’d been hit, to put it plainly. A blow to the head in direct consequence to the challenge Erik made against Apocalypse, when they’d still been on that cliff. There’d been a terrifying blankness to Apocalypse’s face, then he signaled for his remaining followers to attack—that hadn’t ended well, either.

Without his chair, Charles couldn’t move himself from the line of fire. He’d subdued Psylocke and Storm before Apocalypse could stop him, but hadn’t accounted for the sheer breadth of Angel’s wingspan. Charles had been little more than an afterthought, really; it was only Angel’s wings mantling, sweeping round to hit _Erik_ , that had inadvertently swatted Charles aside.

It was a hard enough blow to knock Charles out, only ... he hadn’t the slightest clue how he’d gotten where he was now. Perhaps Moira ... ?

Jean sent another image as she shifted on her feet. It was her fighting stance, he knew. The same as the way she lifted her hands, palm down and elbows tight. Through the link between their minds, he could sense every bit of debris, metal or otherwise, in a ten miles radius—nowhere near as incredible, in practice, as the idea that she could actively keep up with an awareness of that caliber with minimal effort.

Uncertainty soured her thoughts. Some two hundred feet away, a vortex of fractured beams and wire and roof shingles, all of it _metal_ , orbited in a tight spiral around the lone figure of Magneto—the name a foreign concept, even in Jean’s mind—amongst the decimated buildings.

Apocalypse wasn’t far; the god held both arms up and in front of him as he pulled snake-like shapes from the sand—all of which surged forward, one after the other, to explode against Erik’s shield.

Jean wanted to assist. _My power is like Magneto’s!_ her mind reasoned. She could _help_.

 _Wait, Jean_ , Charles instructed.

Because beneath Jean’s wavering was something else. More uncertainty, doubt, that Charles didn’t need to dig to find the truth in. For Jean presented it to him herself: the image of Magneto floating down from the mountain with Charles in his arms and a feral, ugly coldness in those pale eyes. _We’d just arrived_ , Jean supplied as the rest of the memory played out. _Professor, he saved you! But then he—it doesn’t make sense! He told us to stay out of his way. That he would kill Apocalypse himself before giving humans what they deserve._

That was Apocalypse’s doing, of course. Using Erik’s pain as a lens to expand the scope of devastation he wished to inflict upon the world. If only Charles had been there, had gotten to Erik before he was led astray—

Perhaps that _was_ wrong of him to hope. After all, Erik was no more a sheep than Charles was able to walk. Still—it was outright _giving in_ to his rage that Erik would not have done on his own. And to think, ten years past and Charles always hoped that Erik had finally found peace...

At his side, Moira shifted uneasily, “Charles, what—“

In hindsight, he should’ve known his connection with Jean would attract the wrong kind of attention.

He just didn’t expect it to _hurt_. Sparks of raw power flickered along his mind, probing. Through Jean’s eyes, Charles saw Apocalypse smile, grand and victorious.

“Foolish child, I cannot do this without you. So: to kill you,” Apocalypse pondered, and at once, he turned to lock eyes with Jean, “Unless ...”

Two things happened in tandem.

The helmet newly placed upon Erik’s head disintegrated into sand, and Charles’ mind _erupted in flames_.


End file.
